So here we go!

Now I have to be honest up front--I try to do these blog things all the time and they always fall by the wayside. It's like the kid who gets a new toy at Christmas and by New Year's he wants something newer and better. But I promise as long as I'm working, the stories will flow!
So let's get started with blog entry number one shall we?

The art of filmmaking is universal. No matter what variables exist, the basic principles of filmmaking are the same. This has been my philosophy for years...but all that went out the window here in the past few weeks like spitting that used piece of gum out the car window.

I'm currently going into week three of my current feature. It's a Bollywood feature over here from India. Now as exciting as that sounds, I have to tell you that it's really a mess. Okay I shouldn't say a mess because that's saying that there's still a glimmer of hope that it may be somthing of substance. It's a fucking nightmare! Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a racist fellow and all the crew from India are really nice people, but I'm starting to think that curry can cause brain damage.

Now the problem begins above the line on this one. The director/actor/funder of the movie is named Puneet. Do you remember the movie Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom? There was a character named Mola Ram and he was the head god of the temple of doom. Well I kid you not that this is what Puneet looks like. In the Temple of Doom, Mola Ram's most poinenet moment in the movie is he shoves his hand into a guys chest, pulls out his beating heart and yells "Kali ma"!

We think this is going to happen any day now...

Puneet treats everyone as if they are inferior. He at times will tell you to your face that you don't know what your talking about and he does. After all we are just "dumb Americans". Little does Puneet know that the jokes on him. I can only sum it up in one example. There's one girl on the crew from India. She's a very nice girl and really the only one that can speak good English. When we first started this film we asked her about Puneet. She thought for a minute and said, "Um...I think you call him shitbag in your country no?" That's all we needed to know.

The past two weeks have been disaster after disaster all the while Indians and Americans running around keeping their chests out of Puneets reach. There is a good chance that if you were to visit the set one day, you would actually hear the words kali ma echo through. That's usually us Americans though because when you get so frusturated at everything it's pointless to cuss at these people becasue they just smile and bob their heads back at forth at you. We usually just shake are sunburned sore arms at the sky and scream "Kali Ma!" hoping that something would happen. Sorry to report that it hasn't worked yet.

Yesterday we wrapped week two. We all were excited that the week was coming to an end and yesterday was supposed to be an easy day. We soon learned that "easy" is a word that is used lightly in the Indain culture. Infact it's very possible that if you pointed to a tree and asked them what it was they would reply "It's easy." We were shooting in a public park in Beverly Hills which is always a big no-no. Tourists. Tourists suck with a passion; Their like mosquitos with cameras.

As we all arrive to the location we are sitting waiting for our equipment trucks to show up. It's the usual chaos of nobody really knowing what's happeneing today or what we are going to shoot. Infact Mola Ram...I mean Puneet tends to write the script as we go along.

I won't even get started on that soapbox.

Anyways, we see the trucks coming up the street so we are happy at least knowing that our equipment made it today. Now Beverly Hills streets are perfectly manicured with beautiful trees that line the streets. Beautiful low-clearence trees I might add. So as we sit there we watch as one of our trucks runs into one of these beautiful trees. So much so that the truck stops dead in it's tracks. That's when you know that it's not going to be a good day. I guess one branch was sticking a little further into the street than the driver thought and it caught the top of the truck. Again cause for the label "dumb American". Now the fireworks began when our boss showed up. He's a hot-tempered guy that really can't control his mouth when he gets angry. Some might call this Bipolarism but in our world we call it a normal day at work. Now when the truck hit the tree, most of the Indian crew was right there watching it happen. As our boss began to explode at the driver, the Indians simply stood there and bobbed their heads watching. When our boss realized that they were all starring at him probably the greatest line out of his mouth to date pierced the airwaves. Religious people cover your ears! As he walked by them he stopped and perred his eyes at the Indians and with his blood red face he yells,

" what the fuck are you Indians looking at? If you don't stop starring at me I'm going to pull your little Indian heads off and shit down your throats all of you!"

Then he walked away. The Indians looked at each other and bobbed their heads out of confusion.
We on the other hand watched each others jaws drop to the pavement. Did he really just say that? We all looked at each other and knew that there was really only one thing to say after that...Kali Ma!